Last Friday, the World Intellectual Property Organization’s (WIPO) 185 country-members concluded another round of negotiations on exceptions and limitations for the blind and persons with printing disabilities. However, they did not reach a consensus on many of its most contentious issues, such as allowing exports of adapted works across borders and circumventing technological protection measures to enable accessibility. People with hearing disabilities were also written out of the draft. In addition, US negotiators were able to block exceptions and limitations for audiovisual works, under the pressure of MPAA. Who loses? All of us, but especially the 285 million visually impaired people in the world.

The relentless expansion of intellectual property from the developed world to the developing world is rooted in a key international agreement: it’s called the Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights (colloquially, “TRIPS”), and it was enacted in 1994 by the World Trade Organization (WTO). TRIPS was envisioned as a means for expanding markets for intellectual property (IP), and of reducing barriers to international trade in intellectual property, through the effective protection of intellectual property rights. For some, effective protection of intellectual property is associated with high standards of protection and enforcement.

There is a chronic lack of material in formats accessible to the world’s visually impaired and print disabled citizens. Visually impaired people face a “book famine” in which 95% of books published in rich countries and 99% in poorer countries are never converted into accessible formats such as audio, large print or braille.1 The fastest way to address this famine is to change the copyright law: create exceptions and limitations that permit shifting of content into formats accessible to the blind, and allow cross-border exchange of content in accessible formats.

A new international treaty will add another layer of legal restrictions on audiovisual performances by giving the performers—actors, musicians, dancers and others—a new copyright-like right that will exist alongside copyright.